Interactive Brokers

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Interactive Brokers LLC
Interactive Brokers Group
WebsiteOfficial website Edit this at Wikidata
Footnotes / references
[1]

Interactive Brokers LLC (IB) is an American multinational

forex, bonds, funds, and some cryptocurrencies
.

The company is headquartered in

US$348.5 billion in customer equity. Interactive Brokers Group owned 40 percent of the now-closed futures exchange OneChicago,[3] and it is an equity partner and founder of the Boston Options Exchange
.

The original organization was first created as a market maker in 1977 under the name T.P. & Co., and was renamed Timber Hill Inc. in 1982. It became the first to use fair value pricing sheets on an exchange trading floor in 1979, and the first to use handheld computers for trading, in 1983. In 1987, Peterffy also created the first fully automated algorithmic trading system, to automatically create and submit orders to a market. Between 1993 and 1994, the corporate group Interactive Brokers Group was created, and the subsidiary Interactive Brokers LLC was created to control its electronic brokerage, and to keep it separate from Timber Hill, which conducts market making. In 2014, Interactive Brokers became the first online broker to offer direct access to IEX, a private forum for trading securities. As of 2021, about 23.5 percent of the company is publicly held, while the remainder is held by employees and their affiliates; Thomas Peterffy is the largest shareholder.

History

Peterffy holding his computer in an interview
Peterffy talking about his handheld computers in a CNBC interview, 2016

In 1977,

American Stock Exchange (AMEX) as an individual market maker. The following year, he formed his first company, named T.P. & Co., to expand trading activities to several members under badge number 549. At the time, trading used an open outcry system; Peterffy developed algorithms to determine the best prices for options and used those on the trading floor,[4] and thus the firm became the first to use daily printed fair value pricing sheets. In 1979, the company expanded to employ four traders, three of whom were AMEX members. In 1982, Peterffy renamed T.P. & Co. to Timber Hill Inc.; he named it after a road to a favorite retreat,[5][6]: 30–31  one of his properties on Hutchin Hill Road in Woodstock, New York. By 1983, Peterffy was sending orders to the floor from his upstairs office; he devised a system to read the data from a Quotron machine by measuring the electric pulses in the wire and decoding them. The data would be then sent through Peterffy's trading algorithms, and then Peterffy would call down the trades.[6]: 33  After pressure to become a true market maker and keep constant bids and offers, Peterffy knew that he would need his employees to closely pay attention to market movements, and that handheld computers would help. At the time, the AMEX didn't permit computers on the trading floor. Because of this, Peterffy had an assistant deliver market information from his office in the World Trade Center.[6]: 11  In November 1983 he convinced the exchange to allow computer use on the floor.[5]

In 1983, Peterffy sought to computerize the options market, and he first targeted the Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE).[5] At the time, brokers still used fair value pricing sheets, which were by then updated once or twice a day. In 1983, Timber Hill created the first handheld computers used for trading. As Peterffy explained in a 2016 interview, the battery-powered units had touch screens for the user to input a stock price and it would produce the recommended option prices,[7][8] and it also tracked positions and continually repriced options on stocks.[9] However, he immediately encountered opposition from the heads of the exchange. When he first brought a 12-inch-long (30 cm) by 9-inch-wide (23 cm) device to the exchange floor, a committee in the exchange told him it was too big. When he made the device smaller, the committee stated that no analytic devices were allowed to be used on the exchange floor. Effectively blocked from using the CBOE, he sought to use his devices in other exchanges.[5]

Colored computer screens used for stock trading
Images of the displays used at the NYSE to direct traders

Also in 1983, Timber Hill expanded to 12 employees and began trading on the Philadelphia Stock Exchange. In 1984, Timber Hill began coding a computerized stock index futures and options trading system and, in February 1985, Timber Hill's system and network was brought online. The system was designed to centrally price and manage risk on a portfolio of equity derivatives traded in multiple locations around the country.[9] In 1985, Peterffy introduced his computer system to the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), which allowed it. However, the stock exchange only allowed it to be used at trading booths several yards away from where transactions were executed. Peterffy responded by designing a code system for his traders to read colored bars emitted in patterns from the video displays of computers in the booths. This caused the exchange and other members to be suspicious of insider trading, which convinced Timber Hill to distribute instructions throughout the exchange, describing how to read the displays.[5] In response, the exchange required the company to turn the screens away from the trading floor, which prompted Peterffy to hire a clerk to communicate with the traders via hand signals. Eventually computers were allowed on the trading floor.[10]

The 1973–2001 World Trade Center seen from the Hudson River
In the 1980s, the company was located in the World Trade Center.

Timber Hill joined the

Pacific Stock Exchange and the options division of the NYSE the following year. Also in 1985, the firm joined and began trading on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, the Chicago Board of Trade and the Chicago Board Options Exchange. In 1986, the company moved its headquarters to the World Trade Center to control activity at multiple exchanges. Peterffy again hired workers to sprint from his offices to the exchanges with updated handheld devices, which he later superseded with phone lines carrying data to computers at the exchanges. Peterffy later built miniature radio transmitters into the handhelds and the exchange computers to allow data to automatically flow to them.[6]
: 39 

In 1987, Timber Hill joined the National Securities Clearing Corporation and the Depository Trust Company (now merged as the

Eurex. At that time, Timber Hill had 142 employees.[9]

While Peterffy was trading on the Nasdaq in 1987,[11] he created the first fully automated algorithmic trading system. It consisted of an IBM computer that would pull data from a Nasdaq terminal connected to it and carry out trades on a fully automated basis. The machine, for which Peterffy wrote the software, worked faster than a trader could.[6]: 12–14  Upon inspection, the Nasdaq banned direct interface with the terminal, and required trades to be typed in manually. Peterffy and his team designed a system with a camera to read the terminal, a computer to decode the visual data, and mechanical fingers to type in the trade orders, which was then accepted by the Nasdaq.[6]: 17 

1993 to 2000

Interactive Brokers Inc. was incorporated in 1993 as a U.S. broker-dealer, to provide technology developed by Timber Hill for electronic network and trade execution services to customers.

In 1994, Timber Hill Europe began trading at the

Belgium Futures and Options Exchange
, IB became a member of the New York Stock Exchange, and the Timber Hill Group LLC was formed as a holding company of Timber Hill and IB's operations.

In 1995, Timber Hill France S.A. was incorporated and began making markets at the Marché des Options Négociables de Paris (a subsidiary of

trading platform Trader Workstation and executed its first trades for public customers.[9]

In 1996, Timber Hill Securities Hong Kong Limited was incorporated and began trading at the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

In 1997, Timber Hill Australia Pty Limited was incorporated in Australia, and Timber Hill Europe began trading in Norway and became a member of the Austrian Derivatives Exchange. By 1997, Timber Hill had 284 employees.

In 1998, Timber Hill Canada Company was formed, and IB began to clear online trades for retail customers connected directly to

S&P
futures.

In 1999, IB introduced a

equity options and began to clear trades for its customer stocks and equity derivatives trades.[9] Also in 1999, Goldman Sachs attempted to purchase the company and was turned away.[5]

In 2000, Interactive Brokers (U.K.) Limited was formed and Timber Hill became a Primary Market Maker on the International Securities Exchange (ISE).[9]

2001 to present

An office room with computers, monitors, and desks
Company trading floor

In 2001, the corporate name of the Timber Hill Group LLC was changed to Interactive Brokers Group LLC, which at the time handled 200,000 trades per day.

In 2002, Interactive Brokers, along with the

application programming interface for customers and developers to integrate their mobile phone systems with the IB trading system.[13] Also in 2002, Timber Hill became the major market maker for the newly introduced U.S. single-stock futures
.

In 2003, Interactive Brokers expanded its trade execution and clearing services to include Belgian index options and futures, Canadian stocks, equity/index options and futures, Dutch index options and futures, German equity options, Italian index options and futures, Japanese index options and futures, and U.K. equity options. In 2004, IB introduced direct market access to its customers on the Frankfurt and Stuttgart exchanges. In the same year, IB upgraded its account management system and Trader Workstation, adding real-time charts, scanners, fundamental analytics, and tools BookTrader and OptionTrader to the platform.

In 2005, IB released its forex trading platform IdealPro (now Ideal FX).

In 2006, the IB Options Intelligence Report was launched to report on unusual concentrations of trading interests and changing levels of uncertainty in the option markets. Also in that year, IBG took stakes in OneChicago, the ISE Stock Exchange, and the CBOE Stock Exchange. In 2006, Interactive Brokers started offering penny-priced options.[9][14]

On May 3, 2007, IBG held its

WR Hambrecht (which handled Google's IPO similarly in 2004) and HSBC;[8][16] it was the second-largest U.S. IPO that year[6] and the largest brokerage IPO since 2005.[16] The shares sold represented approximately 10 percent of the interest in IBG LLC.[17] Also in 2007, a real-time Portfolio Margin platform was introduced for customers trading multiple asset classes, providing increased leverage with real-time risk management; as well, the company introduced exchanges for physicals
for customers to exchange stocks and futures with a market-determined rate.

In 2008, the company released Risk Navigator, a real-time market risk management platform. Also in 2008, several trading algorithms were introduced to the Trader Workstation. Among these is the Accumulate-Distribute Algo, which allows traders to divide large orders into small non-uniform increments and release them at random intervals over time to achieve better prices for large volume orders.[9]

In 2009, IB launched iTWS, a mobile trading app based on IB's Trader Workstation; it also released the Portfolio Analyst tool.

In 2011, the company introduced several new services, including the Interactive Brokers Information System, Hedge Fund Capital Introduction Program, and the Stock Yield Enhancement Program. Interactive Brokers also became in 2011 the largest online U.S. broker as measured by

the 1%",[18] which were seen as a controversial criticism of the protests.[19][20][21]

In 2012, IB began offering

money manager accounts and opened the fully electronic Money Manager Marketplace. IB also released the TWS Mosaic trading interface and the Tax Optimizer for managing capital gains and losses
.

In 2013, IB released the Probability Lab tool and Traders' Insight, a service that provides daily commentary by Interactive Brokers traders and third party contributors. Also in 2013, IB integrated its trading notification tool (called IB FYI) into the TWS.[9] The tool keeps customers informed of upcoming announcements that could impact their account, and a customer can set it to automatically act to exercise options early if the action is projected to be beneficial for the customer. An IB FYI also can act to automatically suspend a customer's orders before the announcement of major economic events that influence the market.[22]

On April 3, 2014, Interactive Brokers became the first online broker to offer direct access to IEX, a private electronic communication network for trading securities, which was subsequently registered as an exchange.[23]

In 2015, IB created the service Investors' Marketplace, which allows customers to find investors and other service providers in the financial industry.[24] IB also gained clients through Scottrade that year; Scottrade had previously offered complex option trading through its platform OptionsFirst, and began offering trading through IB's platform.[25]

In March 2016, IB released a companion app to iTWS for the Apple Watch.[26]

In May 2017, IB announced the sale of the market making business conducted by its Timber Hill subsidiary, including its market making software, to New York-based

Two Sigma Securities.[27][28]

Milan Galik was appointed chief executive officer of Interactive Brokers Group in 2019, succeeding founder Thomas Peterffy, who remained as chairman of the board.[29]

In 2019, IB launched the low-cost account offering "IBKR Lite" and fractional share trading.[30][31][32]

In 2020, the customer base grew to one million users.[33] During the GameStop short squeeze, Interactive Brokers briefly restricted trading of several stocks, along with other brokerages.[34][35]

In 2021, the company announced that users would be able to trade cryptocurrencies such as

Ethereum.[36][37] The company charges commissions of 0.12 to 0.18% of the traded amount.[38]

Operations

A dark office filled with computers; screens of financial data fill one wall
IB Technical Operations

Interactive Brokers is the largest electronic brokerage firm in the US by number of daily average revenue trades,

contracts for difference since 2008.[44] As of 2015, mobile transactions accounted for about 10% of the company's retail orders.[45]

Employees

Interactive Brokers Group has 11 directors, including Thomas Peterffy, chairman of the board of directors, who as the

IT workers; programmers outnumber other employees five to one.[5] As of 2015, approximately nine percent of employees work in legal or regulatory compliance departments.[48]

Among the company's directors are Lawrence E. Harris, a professor at the

Marshall School of Business, and who was chief economist of the Securities and Exchange Commission.[49] Among its former directors are Hans Stoll, founder and director of the Financial Markets Research Center at Vanderbilt University, and an author and former president of the American Finance Association,[47]: 22 [50] and Ivers Riley, former chairman of the International Securities Exchange, CEO of the Hong Kong Futures Exchange, and chief developer of SPDR funds.[51]

Locations

Interactive Brokers maintains a 163,510-square-foot (15,191 m2) headquarters in downtown Greenwich, Connecticut.

better source needed] More than half of the company's customers reside outside the United States, in approximately 200 countries.[52]
: 15 

Media

The first chapter of Christopher Steiner's 2012 book

Automate This: How Algorithms Came to Rule Our World describes Thomas Peterffy's development of Interactive Brokers and the technologies that have led to the modern automated market.[6] Four chapters of Scott Patterson's Dark Pools: The Rise of the Machine Traders and the Rigging of the U.S. Stock Market also detail Peterffy and his company.[53]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ A fully disclosed account provides client information and identification, while a non-disclosed account provides no client data to the broker.[2]

References

  1. ^ "2023 Form 10-K". U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. February 27, 2024.
  2. ^ "Configuring Your Account: Account Structures". Interactive Brokers Group. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  3. ^ Moyer, Liz. "The Wallendas Hit Wall Street". Forbes. Retrieved November 15, 2022.
  4. ^ a b Brown, Abram (November 5, 2014). "Billionaire Thomas Peterffy Practically Invented Digital Trading. Now He Wants To Be Your Broker". Forbes. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h McGee, Susan (November 10, 2005). "A Breed Apart". Institutional Investor. No. November 2005. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  6. ^
    OCLC 757470260
    . Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  7. ^ Peterffy, Thomas (April 25, 2016). "Pro Talks: Billionaire Wall Street Pioneer Peterffy" (Interview). Interviewed by Mike Santoli. CNBC. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  8. ^ a b Moyer, Liz (May 4, 2007). "He Told You So". Forbes. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l "About the Interactive Brokers Group". Interactive Brokers Group. January 1, 2016. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  10. ^ Story, Louise (November 11, 2005). "See! The Street Was Paved With Gold". The New York Times. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  11. National Public Radio
    . Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  12. ISBN 9780470047361
    . Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  13. ^ Fontanella-Khan, James (September 10, 2010). "India moves into mobile phone shares trading". Financial Times. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  14. ^ Schmerken, Ivy (October 25, 2006). "Interactive Brokers Offers Penny Priced Options". Wall Street & Technology. UBM. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  15. ^ 1634–1699: McCusker, J. J. (1997). How Much Is That in Real Money? A Historical Price Index for Use as a Deflator of Money Values in the Economy of the United States: Addenda et Corrigenda (PDF). American Antiquarian Society. 1700–1799: McCusker, J. J. (1992). How Much Is That in Real Money? A Historical Price Index for Use as a Deflator of Money Values in the Economy of the United States (PDF). American Antiquarian Society. 1800–present: Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. "Consumer Price Index (estimate) 1800–". Retrieved February 29, 2024.
  16. ^ a b Cameron, Doug (May 4, 2007). "IPO values Interactive Brokers at $12bn". Financial Times. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  17. ^ Bunge, Jacob (April 19, 2012). "Interactive Brokers Founder, CEO To 'Gradually' Retire". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  18. The Huffington Post
    . Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  19. ^ Roose, Kevin (March 26, 2012). "Is It O.K. to Joke About Occupy Now?". The New York Times. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  20. ^ Mucha, Thomas (March 26, 2012). "Open season on Occupy Wall Street?". Public Radio International. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  21. ISBN 978-1-138-90875-8
    . Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  22. ^ "IB FYI". Interactive Brokers Group. 2016. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  23. ^ "Interactive Brokers Adds IEX as an Electronic Trading Venue (press release)". Business Wire. April 3, 2014. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  24. ^ Carrel, Lawrence (January 22, 2016). "Interactive Brokers Aims For Best Platform, Lowest Price". Investor's Business Daily. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  25. Barron's
    . Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  26. ^ Wells, Juana (March 9, 2016). "Interactive Brokers Adds Apple Watch Support to IB TWS Mobile Trading App". SMN Weekly. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  27. ^ Louis, Brian; Kishan, Saijel (May 9, 2017). "Two Sigma to Buy Interactive Brokers' Options Trading Unit". Bloomberg. Retrieved May 25, 2017.
  28. ^ Banerji, Gunjan; Osipovitch, Alexander (May 9, 2017). "Two Sigma Agrees to Buy Interactive Brokers' Options Market-Making Arm". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved May 26, 2017.
  29. ^ Schott, Paul (January 7, 2019). "Greenwich-based Interactive Brokers' CEO to step down". GreenwichTime. Retrieved November 13, 2022.
  30. ^ "Interactive Brokers Rolls Out Fractional Trading". Wealth Management. November 27, 2019. Retrieved November 13, 2022.
  31. ^ Fitzgerald, Maggie. "TD Ameritrade and other brokerages' shares tank after Interactive Brokers unveils service offering commission-free stock trades". CNBC. Retrieved November 13, 2022.
  32. ISSN 0190-8286
    . Retrieved November 13, 2022.
  33. ^ https://bbj.hu/business/tech/fintech/trading-platforms-enjoy-record-growth-of-customers  [dead link]
  34. ^ "GameStop mania may not have been the retail trader rebellion it was perceived to be, data shows". CNBC. February 5, 2021.
  35. ^ "Why broker-dealers restricted GameStop trading — and why advisors had better pay attention". February 5, 2021.
  36. ^ GmbH, finanzen net. "Interactive Brokers launches cryptocurrency trading for clients". Business Insider. Retrieved September 14, 2021.
  37. ^ "Interactive Brokers launches cryptocurrency trading". Reuters. September 13, 2021.
  38. ^ "Interactive Brokers Launches Cryptocurrency Trading, Custody Via Paxos". Benzinga. September 14, 2021.
  39. ^ "IB Fact Sheet". Interactive Brokers Group. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  40. ^ Golovtchenko, Victor (April 19, 2016). "Exclusive: Q1 US Retail Traders Profitability Falls, Accounts on the Rise". Finance Magnates. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  41. ^ "Improving Prime Brokerage Market Share Should Lift Profits At Goldman, Morgan Stanley". Forbes. October 7, 2015. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  42. ^ "Interactive Brokers Rated #1 Online Broker by Barron's for the Third Year in a Row (press release)". KSL. Business Wire. March 19, 2014. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  43. ^ a b c "2021 Form 10-K". Interactive Brokers. February 25, 2022. Retrieved April 27, 2022.
  44. ^ "Interactive Brokers Launches Contracts for Difference in Australia (press release)". Business Wire. October 21, 2008. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  45. ^ Carey, Theresa W. (March 7, 2015). "Barron's 2015 Best Online Broker Ranking". Barron's. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  46. ^ "2020 Annual Report". Interactive Brokers. pp. 17–19. Archived from the original on January 20, 2022. Retrieved January 20, 2022.
  47. ^ a b c "2016 Annual Report" (PDF). Interactive Brokers Group. 2016. Retrieved February 17, 2019.
  48. ^ "2015 Annual Report" (PDF). Interactive Brokers Group. 2015. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  49. ^ "Professor Larry Harris". University of Southern California. July 7, 2012. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  50. ^ "Hans R. Stoll". Vanderbilt University. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  51. ^ Arnold, Laurence (February 19, 2015). "Ivers W. Riley, Who Helped Introduce Spider ETF, Dies at 82". Bloomberg. Retrieved March 27, 2017.
  52. ^ "2017 Annual Report". Interactive Brokers Group. March 1, 2018. Retrieved September 23, 2019.
  53. OCLC 849740364
    . Retrieved March 27, 2017.

External links

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